


Silver Wishes

by TruthandLies



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: College Parties, F/F, Isle of the Lost (Disney), Pirates, Wonderland, cookie cookie cookie, zip-lining
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-02
Updated: 2018-01-02
Packaged: 2019-02-26 14:57:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,441
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13238154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TruthandLies/pseuds/TruthandLies
Summary: Evie has always wished upon a star at New Year's, but her wishes have never come true. Until she turns sixteen, and is reunited with a fiery green-eyed girl she once met as a child, before a number of unfortunate events led to their separation.In this story, Evie celebrates a series of assorted New Year's with her dragon-hearted Mal. These celebrations include:*a fight aboard a blazing pirate ship and a dangerous confrontation with Maleficent*the first confessions of love between two best friends, and the shyness and giddiness which follows*a honeymoon in Wonderland*and a glimpse at their growing family: a mischievous, cookie-loving five-year-old, and a sixteen-year-old every bit as wicked as her mothersWithin this tale, you'll find two new graphics and real pages from Evie's journal.Note that this is part of the “Hearts of Fabric, Paint and Snow” universe.





	Silver Wishes

**Author's Note:**

> Most pictures are licensed by the public domain or hand-crafted. The exception are those pieces of images that come from the Descendants' franchise, which have been transformed in the pursuit of art and in the interests of celebrating these wonderful characters. I do not own these characters or the song lyrics present in this story (which also belong to the Descendants' franchise), nor do I make any money from these stories.
> 
> So it turns out that I just can't leave behind the _Hearts of Fabric, Paint and Snow_ AU. It's too precious to my heart. I hope you enjoy this newest story.
> 
> NOTE: As with _Hearts of Fabric, Paint and Snow_ , this story does contain some racy elements. I'm keeping it rated "teen" because there's nothing in this fic that couldn't also be found in a book within the young adult section of a bookstore.
> 
> Many blessings. – T&L

Evie once treasured a book about New Year’s she’d smuggled from a castle fashion tutor (because smuggling books was really the only way she could keep them; her poisoned-apple mother was too strict about _princes don’t like intelligent girls_ and _really, you should spend more time on your complexion and less time on your mind – is that a pimple on your chin, Evelyn?_ ). 

She’d hidden this book in her castle tower bedroom, beneath a loose stone in her floor. And every once in a while, when her chest ached for freedom and her mind ached for knowledge, she unearthed her treasure. Words danced across the page, springing into her heart; things like _New Year’s is a time for new beginnings_ and _If you wish upon a star when the clock strikes twelve, your wish will always come true._

Evie stroked the words with the tips of her fingers, relishing their satin-smooth texture beneath her skin.

She stroked those words every year, when the skies darkened to cobalt and the streets transformed into grey slush. And she promised herself that this year, things would change. She would find her freedom. She would break free from her mother’s control and she would discover a certain girl with fiery green eyes – a girl she’d met when she was six, and into whose pocket she had snuck a gift: a fabric heart as green as the girl's eyes.

For years, this girl had lived in Evie’s memories, in her dreams.

The problem was, whenever Evie’s mother forced her to learn about makeup and vanity … or whenever Evie sprung awake from dreams about fiery green eyes … the girl would disappear into a wisp of dream-wish smoke. And Evie would be left alone, clinging to the image of a girl she might never meet again.

Because that girl’s dragon lady mother had locked Evie and her own mother inside their castle after Evie’s mother refused to let Evie issue the fiery-green-eyed girl a birthday invitation. _(“We do not give little girls hearts. We save our hearts for little boys.”)_

And Evie had no hope for escape so long as the dragon lady clung to her vengeful heart.

So every year at New Year’s, Evie took her smuggled book’s advice and wished upon a star, which was always dimly lit behind the Isle’s angry grey clouds: “I wish for freedom,” she’d tell the faint silver light; or “I wish to break free from the castle and find the girl with the fiery green eyes;” she’d whisper to the dim heavens; or, when her heart was cracking from yet another motherly rebuke, she’d murmur, “I just want her. Please send her to me. Please?”

But none of Evie’s wishes ever came true.

And when her book fell apart from too many touches, she stopped wishing altogether.

Because why would the world grant a wish to a girl who couldn’t even please her own mother? A girl whose complexion was too marred and whose eyelashes were too pale and whose eyebrows were too thick?

Wishes were for girls pretty enough to please their mothers and their mother’s princes. And Evie was never going to be a girl like that.

Or so she told herself.

The funny thing was, when her time came to please someone, that person wasn’t a mother. And she wasn’t a prince.

She was a girl with fiery green eyes.

A girl Evie met once her mother freed her from her castle banishment _(because Mother was out of wrinkle cream, and Mother’s complexion was more important than Evie’s safety from the dragon lady)_.

A girl who hated Evie at first – she’d never forgiven Evie for breaking her heart by withholding a certain birthday invitation – but who soon released her anger and started looking at Evie with deep and vulnerable eyes.

Eyes that deepened and turned more vulnerable when Evie revealed it was she who had snuck the green fabric heart into her pocket. Eyes that deepened further when Evie gave her another heart: a heart Evie had painted in chaotic green wisps on the back of a pink-purple-and-green jacket she’d sewn to keep the girl warm from winter chill (because the girl's mother, the dragon lady, had burned all the girl’s other jackets, determined to make her as cold on the outside as she wanted her to be on the inside).

The girl’s name was Mal. Or M, as Evie called her when she, herself, was feeling vulnerable. And after Evie gifted her that jacket – and Mal gifted Evie her first real science book – Mal became Evie’s whole world.

Of course, this world was new. Because the gift-giving had happened just a week ago on Christmas. And Evie still shivered whenever Mal gazed at her with her deep and vulnerable eyes. Or when Mal sat beside her in their warehouse, reading the science book over Evie’s shoulder and brushing Evie’s arm with her fingertips.

_“Sorry, E,” she’d murmur. “Didn’t mean to touch you.”_

__

__

_But she’d somehow scooted closer and was touching Evie again._

_So Evie took the opportunity to slip her fingers through the spaces of Mal’s hand. “Please don’t stop, M. I like it when you touch me.”_

_Mal’s gaze turned a shade more vulnerable. “Then I’ll keep doing it for as long as you want.”_

_“I guess you’ll be touching me forever then.” Evie tucked Mal’s hand into the crook of her arm._

And Evie realized that was her New Year’s wish: That Mal would never stop looking at her with that deep and vulnerable gaze. And that she would never stop feathering her fingers across Evie’s skin.

Mal’s touch was as fiery as her eyes, as fiery as her hair, which shone like purple flames. And Evie longed to wrap herself in the warmth of this fiery fairy for forever and a fairy-blessed day.

Which was why, on her first New Year’s outside the confines of her castle, she snuck to the docks with Mal and the boys – her new gang of VKs – and hid in the shadows created by pirate ships. Because according to Mal, “New Year’s isn’t New Year’s without stolen rum,” and according to Jay, a member of their VK gang, “The best kind of rum is smuggled from Auradon by the pirates.” 

_(According to Evie, New Year’s would be much more New Year’s-y if she was cuddling in the warehouse with Mal, away from the men with the swords. But the girl with the fiery green eyes wanted rum, and so Evie was determined to flirt her way to treasure.)_

This, then, brings us to the present moment in the girls’ history, at least in terms of this chronological recounting: A moment when Evie stands with the other VKs on the Isle’s splintered docks, where pirates stalk on wooden legs and their brethren fight and frolic aboard ships stock-piled with gold and rum.

And on these splintered docks, Evie’s fellow VK, Jay, crouches into a pose of conspiracy, hands placed on knees. “Okay, here’s how it’s gonna work. The muscle – me and Mal,” he says, tipping his head at the frowning fairy, “will do the heavy lifting. You know. The stealing, and the knocking out the teeth of anyone who gets in our way.”

“Works for me.” Mal cracks her knuckles.

“And me?” Carlos points to himself with his thumb. “Please tell me I’m not distraction.”

“Not this time, man.” Jay claps a hand to Carlos’ shoulder. “No, you’re back-up. If me or Mal get overloaded, it’ll be your job to clear a path so we can escape.”

“Done.” Carlos rocks back onto his heels. “Much better than last time.”

“And me?” Evie tosses her blue waves over her shoulder. 

“You, my dear girl,” Jay says, stepping to Evie and slinging an arm around her shoulder, “will be the distraction. You’re good at flirting, right?”

Evie puckers her lips into a pout any seductress would be proud to call her own. “I’ve been told I have some tal–”

“Wait.” Mal’s tone cuts like sharpened steel. “I don’t like this plan. Come up with something else.”

And Evie’s chest twists. Twists at the tone of Mal’s voice. And twists at the look in Mal’s eyes. It’s nowhere close to deep and vulnerable. She’s staring at Jay like he’s a carcass and she’s the vulture circling down to swoop on her prey.

“What’s wrong with the plan?” Jay’s words are chilled with challenge.

A challenge Mal must hear, too, because her eyes blaze green. “If you think I’m letting you send Evie onto a ship full of horny, drunken pirates so she can flirt her way to rum, then –”

“You’re the one who wanted the rum.” Jay pokes his finger at Mal.

Mal swats his hand away. “Send Carlos instead. We’ll cannonball him onto the ship like we did last time. He said it was fun.”

“Not that much fun.” Carlos shuffles behind Jay. “And, um, no. I’m still picking splinters out of my…” he shields his behind with both his hands. “…personal spaces.”

Jay holds out his arms as if the matter is settled.

But Mal stalks closer until they are standing nose-to-nose. “She’s not doing it.” She punctuates each word with an exclamation point, her eyes glowing an ethereal green. “Pick another plan.”

Evie’s heart cracks. Cracks for the girl with the fiery green eyes, who conceals so much emotion in her voice, it threatens to drown her with feeling. Cracks for the dragon-hearted girl who cares so deeply, she’s terrified. Terrified in a way, Evie is certain, she’s never been terrified before.

“M.” Evie curls her hand around Mal’s elbow, pulling her back from Jay. “It’s okay.”

“It’s not okay, Evie.” Mal whirls on Evie, her eyes blazing. But she blinks. And a heartbeat later, the blaze fades, leaving her gaze deeper and more vulnerable. “I don’t want you to get hurt. I don’t need the rum that badly.”

Warmth dances into Evie’s chest, curling around her heart. “What do you need?”

Mal swallows. Her fingers travel to the zipper of her jacket, as if she’s remembering the morning a week before when Evie gifted her the coat. “I need…” She nibbles her lower lip, restraining words she is not ready to say. “I just…Let’s go back to the warehouse. We’ll spend New Year’s together. Okay?”

But Evie hears Mal’s unspoken words. She knows what they mean. And in that moment, all Evie wants is to touch the girl with the fiery green eyes. So she cradles her face. And she tucks a strand of purple fire behind her ear. “Sounds perfect,” she whispers.

Mal leans her cheek into the curve of Evie’s palm. Her gaze travels from Evie’s eyes to Evie’s mouth. Her gaze deepens, and she licks her lips.

Evie trembles on a breath. Without thought, she moves a step closer to Mal. Because she wants this. Oh, she wants to taste this fiery fairy’s lips. So she bends until their mouths are a breath apart – 

And freezes as the world disintegrates into cries and shouts and the roar of flame.

Mal jumps back from Evie.

Evie jumps back from Mal. 

And both girls swivel toward the ship, where Jay and Carlos have fallen back on the VKs’ tried-and-tested method of distraction: setting fire to the world.

Several boxes on the pirate ship are ablaze, and Carlos and Jay are backed up against the prow, where sharks circle the waters, nipping at the boys' heels, and pirates stalk forward with sneers and swords. _(“You ruddy kids! Get ready to walk the plank.”)_

And now the ocean is on fire, because pirates are tossing the blazing boxes into the sea.

But Jay and Carlos are cornered. By pirates and by sharks.

And they’re part of Mal and Evie’s gang.

So Mal and Evie exchange a lightning-and-thunder-glance-streaked-with-fear, and rush onto the blazing ship.

Mal elbows two pirates in the jaw, forcing them to their knees, and strips them of their swords. “Like I taught you,” she says, tossing a sword to Evie.

Evie pulls the sword from the air, locking it tight within her fist. And parries weapons with the first two pirates who rush at her through the flames. 

Back-to-back with Mal, she fights, clinging swords and kicking shins. And when the first pirate falls, and then the second and the third, she can’t help but laugh. “So you didn’t want me to flirt, but you’re okay with me fighting on a blazing pirate ship surrounded by sharks?”

“Fight now, E.” Mal parries a pirate’s sword. “Laugh later.”

Which is good advice, since a pirate has just lunged his sword at Evie. The sword’s lethal point pokes into Evie’s chest.

Evie gasps and closes her eyes. Parrying with her sword, she kicks outward at the pirate. 

And her toes lash into something solid. 

The pirate screeches, and Evie opens her eyes to discover him clutching a place below the belt. 

“You brat,” he moans, before dropping his sword to the sharks and buckling to his knees. 

Behind her, Mal whoops. “Good one, Evie!” 

And Evie can’t help but flash a grin. “Totally meant to do that,” she says, parrying her sword against another pirate’s blade. 

Soon, they clear a path for Carlos and for Jay, who stops just long enough to claim two bottles of rum from two fallen pirates. And then, they, the rotten four, sprint off the burning ship and into the grey-clouded night. By the time they’ve reached shore, the flames have dwindled to curlicued streams of smoke.

“Great plan, Jay.” Mal swipes a bottle from Jay. “Those pirates are gonna stalk us for good now.”

“Aw, they’ll forget about it by morning.” Jay waves his hand, knocking back a shot of rum. “Did you see how drunk they all were?”

Mal treats him to a blazing, green-eyed glare. And loops her arm through Evie’s. “Come on, E. I promised you New Year’s at our warehouse.”

They leave the boys with their stolen rum, Jay shouting something about, “A thank you would be nice!”

“I’ll thank him later with my fist,” Mal mutters, taking a sip of rum. She licks the remnants from her lips, and then corks the bottle.

Evie curls her arm around Mal’s shoulder, tucking her into her side. “Just one sip, M? A couple weeks ago, it was the whole bottle.”

Mal fingers the leather of her coat. “Things change, E. Maybe I have something else to occupy my time now.” Her voice is a whisper’s breath, almost quieter than the howl of New Year’s wind.

Evie wants to press. She wants to hear it. She wants to know that Mal thinks of her, that the reason she isn’t drinking so much is because she’s spending so much time with Evie.

But she knows Mal.

And she knows a question-and-answer like that will have Mal burrowing back into her shadowy, reclusive places.

So she settles on leaning her cheek atop Mal’s head. “I like that you have other things to think about,” she whispers. “You wanna know what I think about?”

Mal shivers. “What?”

“I think about you, M. I can’t stop.” She strokes a strand of purple fire, turning Mal's shivers into shakes. “You’re with me in everything I do.”

Mal pulls back a trembling breath. “You, too?”

And maybe Evie was wrong. Maybe Mal is more ready for this than she knew. So she stops right there, in the middle of the sludge-grey street, where broken streetlights fail to illuminate the sidewalks. And she wraps this fiery fairy – this girl with a dragon's heart – into her arms. “My mom always wanted me to find a prince. Who knew I’d find a dragon instead?”

“Told you that princes were overrated.” Mal melts into Evie’s embrace. She melts into her embrace, with her cheek warm against Evie’s face, and her fingers woven through Evie’s hair, and her heart thundering against Evie’s chest. 

She melts and she melts and she melts … until the door to a nearby tavern swings open, and out saunters the dragon lady, her mother.

Mal jumps away, just as she jumped away when the ship was on fire and the boys were being attacked by pirates and by sharks. “Mom.”

The dragon lady surveys the scene with a tilt of her chin, and then her eyes glow green. “Mal. I do hope you weren’t engaged in anything…weak.” She flicks her green-eyed glare to Evie. “Aren’t you supposed to be locked in a castle somewhere?”

Evie stumbles a step back, her breath turning to frost in her throat.

The dragon lady smirks. “It’s funny, Mal.” She flicks her glare back to Mal, and scans her from throat to waist. “I thought I’d burned all your jackets. Where exactly did this one come from?”

Mal squeezes her arms around her beloved jacket, almost as if sheltering it from her mother’s cruelty. _(“Mom burns my jackets. Says maybe if I’m cold on the outside, I’ll be cold on the inside, too.”)_

And something awakens inside of Evie. Something feral. Something with fangs every bit as sharp as the dragon lady’s. “It came from me.” She regains the step she lost, and takes two more. “I made it for her. And she’s keeping this one.” Her voice is forged from iron. Strong. 

So much stronger than it has any right to be, with Maleficent baring her teeth.

She curves a taloned finger, beckoning to Mal. “Give me the jacket, Mal.”

“No.” Mal’s voice is strong, too. Forged from the flames of her own dragon-fire.

Maleficent curls her face to Mal’s, plunging into her space. “What did you just say to me?”

“I said ‘no.’” Mal’s eyes glow a blazing green. “You’re not getting this jacket, Mother.”

Mal locks herself into a duel-of-glares with her mother, green-against-green, a stare-off that threatens to burn them both to ashes.

Until Maleficent sighs. And her green glare fades. “I don’t have time for this.” She straightens, glowering down at them both. “Keep the jacket, you miserable brat. But if I catch you in any weaknesses with this girl,” she says, jabbing a taloned finger at Evie, “I feed her to the sharks.”

With that, she turns on her heel and swoops down the street, disappearing into the darkness.

But Mal is still trembling long after she’s gone.

Later that night, Evie holds Mal close, staring through the dingy windows of their warehouse into the dim-light night. She murmurs things about _you’re so strong_ and _I’m so proud of you_ and _your mother won’t feed me to the sharks_. 

But Mal still trembles. 

She still drinks a third of the bottle of rum.

And when Evie threads her fingers through Mal’s purple-fire hair, Mal’s gaze turns deeper and more vulnerable than she’s ever seen it. “Maybe we should stop,” she whispers. “If she hurts you, E…”

Evie places a finger to Mal’s lips, so plump beneath her skin. “We stood up to her tonight, M. We can stand up to her again.”

Mal’s eyes are full of question-marks and doubts. “You really think so?”

Evie curls Mal into her arms. “Of course I do.” _Because if I have to live without you, it really isn’t living at all. So I’ll stand up to your mother. I’ll stand up to her for us both if I have to._

Mal burrows into the curve of Evie's arms and drifts off to sleep.

When Mal's breathing is even, Evie finds herself a star. “You brought her to me after all these years. Thank you.” She smooths her fingers along Mal’s cheek. “But now I have another wish. Please, please, let me keep her.”

Her words drift off into the silence of the night, fading into the darkness.

Once gone, they do not come true.

* * *

Evie does stand up to the dragon lady.

She stands up to her the day Maleficent discovers Evie feathering kisses along Mal’s jaw, so captivated by the magic of them, of Evie-and-Mal, she forgets she’s kissing Mal outside on the streets, in plain view of so many people roving the Isle.

She stands up to Maleficent when she wraps her fist around Mal’s throat and begins to squeeze. _(“Have you forgotten that love is weakness, my dear girl?”)_.

She stands up to her and stands up to her and stands up to her.

But Mal falls flat. She falls into the darkness of her mother’s lies – anything to protect Evie from the razor jaws of Maleficent and her sharks. _(“I get it, Mom. Love is weakness. We’ll stop. Just don’t hurt Evie.”)_

What happens next is this: Mal steps into a suit of lies crafted from fables she tells herself about the weakness of love and the necessity of cruelty (anything to gain her mother’s favor). 

And when the dragon lady enlists Evie’s mother to keep Evie away from Mal, and Evie’s mother responds by denying Evie food for a week, Evie is forced to slip into a mask crafted from make-up and hair twirls – anything to please her mother and the boys she sends into Evie’s chambers. _(“Kiss them, Evelyn. Touch them, Evelyn. Sigh for them, Evelyn. Learn to love boys, not girls, Evelyn. And for goodness sake, paint your pale eyelashes and get rid of your unibrow.”)_

The problem with lies is that they have a nasty habit of becoming half-truths. And when Mal and Evie escape the clutches of their mothers, leaving the grey-sludge streets of the Isle for the snowy landscapes of Auradon, they have lived in a world of untruths for so long, the landscape of their souls is painted in fables.

There are no wishes in their world.

There are no stars, even those dim-lit in silver.

For Mal, there is only cruelty and a never-ending quest for her mother’s approval.

For Evie, there is only princes and a never-ending quest for _her_ mother’s approval.

And even though they find a way to slip from their suit and mask of lies, choosing goodness over evil, the landscapes of their souls have been forever altered. Mal does not return to Evie; she finds happiness with the king of Auradon _(even going so far as to trade her Evie-jacket for a jacket sewn for the king’s lady by an Auradon seamstress)_. And Evie attempts to find happiness in fashion _(never forgetting how she once found happiness by sewing a coat for a dragon-hearted girl)_ and a boy-who-is-not-a-prince.

But this does not last long.

Evie realizes she will never find happiness with a boy. She will never find happiness with anyone but a fiery fairy, who is so caught up trying to please her king _(much the same way she once tried to please her mother)_ , she fails to notice Evie’s deep-and-longing gazes.

Until one day the fairy starts to notice.

She notices Evie’s soul-deep glances, cast across their dorm room when they are both engaged in homework.

She notices Evie’s skin-to-skin touches, strokes of her fingers across the fairy’s cheeks and arms when they are both sitting side-by-side, enjoying movies or conversation.

She notices and she notices and she notices.

And she starts to return the glances. 

Together, they sit in silence, gazing into each other’s eyes – and the fairy’s gaze becomes deep and vulnerable. 

Together, they sit side-by-side, touching-not-touching _(because neither gives voice to the fact that their skin slides together more often than not – touches of fingers and strokes of arms and caresses of legs)_. 

Together, they step back into the landscape of their yesterday, when the fairy began to melt into Evie’s arms and Evie began to believe in wishes upon stars.

_“I missed this,” the fairy says, stroking fairy-kissed finger touches along the back of Evie’s hand._

__

__

_Evie flips her hand to cradle the fairy’s fingers in the sensitive curve of her palm. “Then don’t stop. Don’t you dare stop ever again.”_

_The fairy’s gaze deepens, and her fingers tremble against Evie’s skin._

But the fairy is Mal. And Mal is still falling in the darkness of her mother’s lies, still caught up in the belief that even when someone isn’t a good fit for you, doesn’t understand you, doesn’t know you as you think, should that person be an authority figure, it’s in your best interest to make that person like you. Whether that person be a dragon lady. Or a golden-hearted king.

This, then, brings us to the New Year’s the girls celebrate the year after Evie makes a wish of forever with her fiery fairy. 

A New Year’s in which the girls are stuck in in-between places: in-between their long-sought world of forever and their long-tortured landscape of lies. 

A New Year’s for which there isn’t much of a record (which tends to happen when desire mingles too closely with suffering), other than Evie’s two journal entries provided for you below (the first smelling faintly of rum):

* * *

Things do change. But they change slow.

They change when Mal breaks up with Ben and begins painting in shades of heartbreak. And Evie dabs the paint from Mal’s skin, curling Mal into the warmth of her arms, always reminding her that she is cared for and wanted.

They change when Mal reminds Evie that she is cared for and wanted, too. When she cuddles with Evie late into the night, particularly on those nights when Evie has worn herself exhausted studying (because she has learned that she can pursue dreams-outside-of-princes, and chooses to exchange worries about her looks for dreams of school smarts and knowledge). On those nights, Mal cuddles Evie close and whispers things about _you’re so smart_ and _you’ve never failed at anything_ and _I believe in you, E, I believe in you so much, I believe in you and I believe in you and…_

Evie believes in Mal, too. She believes in Mal when she helps Mal get into college – the same college Evie, herself, will be attending. And she believes in Mal when they dance together in the halls after Evie receives top grades, and when they dance together in their dorm against a backdrop of silver stars, and when Mal dances her fiery fairy warmth into Evie’s heart, and Evie tells her that her mother was wrong – love isn’t weakness; love is strength.

And the amazing thing is? Mal agrees with her.

And so they take another dance while Mal is (at last) wearing her Evie-jacket and they are both wearing ice skates. On Christmas the year after Evie writes her journal entries, they dance together across a frozen lake, where they confess that the landscape of their love has never changed, despite their two-year lover’s separation. Mal gifts Evie with a heart crafted from snow, and Evie warms Mal’s snowy heart until it melts – and Mal right along with it. And then they share their first kiss, gliding across the ice in a world painted silver with stars.

The December air brushes their skin with a touch of chill. 

So Evie breaks the kiss to gaze up into the heavens. With Mal's hands warm in her own, she chooses herself a star. _I asked you to bring her back to me. I asked you to let me keep her. You’ve given me both. Now I have just one more wish: I wish for forever with Mal._

Mal squeezes Evie’s fingers. Three quick pumps; a pulse of life. “What are you thinking about, E?” 

Evie lowers her heaven-sent gaze to look into into the starry eyes of the girl she loves. “Forever. Are you okay with that, M?”

Mal’s eyes deepen and turn vulnerable. “Forever is a start,” she says. There’s a shiver in her voice – a shiver present in her kiss, when she presses her lips to Evie’s and makes her shiver, too.

And Evie's heart begins to soar.

Being with Mal, loving her, is like stepping into an inferno of all-consuming flame. Flame that doesn’t hurt or burn; flame that strokes Evie’s skin with its fairy-blessed heat, surrounding her in the flickering fires of safety and warmth. 

But this flame does something more.

It steals her breath. 

It wraps tendrils of heat around her heart, making it beat fast-fast-faster, especially when she’s kissing Mal.

And it makes her shy. Because she’s kissing Mal. She’s kissing her best friend. She’s kissing a girl who knows each of her secrets, and each of her flaws, and every one of her mistakes.

She’s kissing a girl who has glimpsed the darkest places of her soul – and still wants to kiss her back.

So when they lay in bed after their ice-skate kisses, curled in each other’s arms, Evie buries her face in the curve of Mal’s throat. Afraid to meet her eyes.

Because she has given Mal the power to glimpse her soul.

And the moment Evie looks into her girlfriend’s fiery green eyes, she knows that Mal will do just that.

And in that moment, maybe she will realize she’s made a mistake.

So Evie hides her face in Mal’s warm skin, annoyed at herself for trembling.

Until Mal slides her fingers beneath Evie’s chin. And lifts Evie’s gaze to meet her own.

Mal’s face glows from the silver splash of stars, reflected through their windows – and from something ethereal that’s lighting her up from deep inside. “I know what you’re doing, E,” she murmurs. “And you can stop.”

Evie swallows a lump that tastes like fire. “Stop what?”

“Come on.” Mal slides a blue curl behind Evie’s ear. “I’m your best friend. Do you really think I don’t know the answer to that?”

Mal’s gaze slips deep inside. So deep, it touches Evie’s heart, and Evie finds herself lowering her lashes. “We’ve been best friends for two years now. This – us – it’s just …” She chews her lip. “…different.”

“Since when is different a bad thing?” Mal cups Evie’s cheek. “Especially when it’s us?”

Evie nuzzles her face into Mal’s palm. “I love you, Mal.”

“And I love you.” Mal strokes Evie’s skin. “So you can stop hiding from me. Because I think we’ve both hidden for long enough. Don’t you?”

Evie trembles on a breath. “I think you’re right.”

After that, the emotion is too fire-hot in Evie’s throat for more talking. So she kisses Mal instead.

But over the next week, she observes her world from beneath lowered lashes. Because it is all too new – kissing Mal and touching her in this forever-kind of way – and the newness seems best observed though half-lidded eyes.

Mal’s eyes are half-lidded, too. Half-lidded when Evie curves into her side, her breath a warmth against Mal’s throat. Half-lidded when Evie curls strands of purple fire behind Mal’s ear. Half-lidded when Evie, lying on Mal’s bed by Mal’s side, strokes Mal’s cheek and whispers, “You’re my everything now.” 

Because even though Evie’s world is painted in halves, she knows this: Mal holds her entire soul in the palm of her dragon-hearted hand. And even in this half-and-half world, Mal-and-Evie are everything.

Mal’s gaze shutters at Evie’s words. "I...you..." She trembles at Evie’s feathering touch. Trembles so completely, she slides away. "Yeah. Me, too."

Evie freezes with her hand half-extended to Mal’s cheek. “M?”

“Sorry, E.” She closes her half-lidded eyes. “You and me. We’re so intense. I’ve never felt anything like us.”

“I know.” Evie strokes Mal's smooth cheekbone. “But you told me not to hide, remember? So you can’t hide either. Open your eyes, dragon-hearted Mal.”

Mal opens her eyes. “This scares me, E. I’m not a good person. You know I’m not. What if I bring you down? Or…”

Evie kisses the tip of Mal’s nose. “Or?”

“What if you decide I’m not good enough for you?” Mal’s words are crafted from all things fragile.

Evie cradles Mal’s chin, holding her words in the palm of her hand. “That’s never going to happen. You’re Mal. And I’m Evie. And Mal-and-Evie belong together.”

Mal holds Evie’s gaze for one heartbeat, then two. And then she turns away, her cheeks flushing crimson. “No one’s ever looked at me the way you do.”

And Evie can’t help the quarter-grin that sneaks past her lips. “Are you turning shy on me, Miss Mal?”

“You turned shy on me first,” Mal grumbles, closing her eyes a second time.

“Hey.” Evie smooths her fingertip across Mal’s eyelids. “Open up.”

Mal sighs. But she opens her eyes, treating Evie to half-a-glimpse of fiery green, deepened and vulnerable.

Evie strokes the skin beneath her girlfriend’s beautiful eyes. “You’re not a bad person, M. You forget: I was there to watch you through everything. I saw you when you were six, the day you stole a child’s ragdoll. Not because you wanted, but because your mother made you. And you fought her first, in a way braver than any six-year old I’ve ever seen.”

Mal claims Evie’s hand, holding it to her face. “But I was six. Look at all the things I’ve done since.”

Evie shakes her head. “I was there for those things, too.” She leaves her claimed hand in Mal’s embrace, but brings her other hand to cup Mal’s heart, thundering beneath her skin. “I was there the day you learned to camouflage your heart with cruelty. Not because you wanted, but to protect me from your mom.”

Mal chews her lip, and her half-gaze transforms into a gaze unreadable. “But I was so cruel, E. I almost took over the world with my cruelty.”

“But you didn’t. You wanna know why?”

Mal nods.

“Because right here, inside your chest,” she says, tapping the place where Mal’s heart crashes beneath her skin, “is the strongest, bravest heart I’ve ever known. Your mom may have dragon fangs, M. But you have a dragon’s heart.”

“How can you be so sure?” Mal’s voice cracks on the words.

“Because I’ve known your heart since I was six-years-old. And I know it now, at eighteen.” Evie transfers Mal’s hand, the one Mal has linked with her own, to the center of Mal’s chest, where Mal’s heart thrums its wild beat. And then she slides Mal’s other hand onto her own chest, where Evie’s heart beats wild, too. “Our hearts have always beat in tandem. Can’t you feel them?”

Mal’s gaze liquifies. “Yeah, E. Yeah, I can.”

After that, Evie curls up into Mal’s shivering arms, where she savors the intensity of their Mal-and-Evie everything-eclipse.

But their worlds are still half-lidded. Their touches are still hesitant, so overpowered by intensity. Their voices still fall beneath whispers when they’re lying in each other’s arms. And on New Year’s, when they meet their friends in the silver star shine spilling across the roof of Auradon Prep, they hold pinkies but not hands.

“So why are we up here?” Lonnie calls to Ben from the other side of the roof, where she’s standing close-so-close to Jane. In the week since the two made out behind a silver-lighted Christmas tree, drunk on punch spiked by Jay and Carlos, they have gravitated together in their own Jane-Lonnie universe of stars.

“I thought we’d celebrate in style.” Ben points to two cords, which run from the edge of the frosted roof down to the snowy ground, extending so far, they disappear into the trees. “New Year’s in metaphors: Leap from the roof into a fresh start.”

“Let me get this straight, man.” Jay steps away from Carlos, where the two are dangerously close to holding hands _(they, too, have become closer after a certain Christmas kiss beneath a mistletoe)_. “You want us to leap from a five-story roof as some metaphorical form of celebration?” 

“You’ll land in the snow.” Ben tips his chin toward the ground, where the world is covered in white. “And I had the zip-line tested by two kingdom engineers. Trust me. It’s safe.”

Carlos thrusts up his hand. “Who votes for heading inside for cookies and rum?”

Evie, whose pulse is crashing into her throat, is just about to raise her hand.

But then Mal the dragon-hearted links her fingers through each of Evie’s. And says: “We’ll go first.”

Evie whips a wide-eyed glance at her girlfriend. “We’ll what now?”

Mal treats Evie to a smile that slips inside, curling each of Evie’s toes. “Afraid to take a leap with me, E?”

And Evie’s pulse stops crashing in fear, and starts crashing for an entirely different reason. Because Mal is asking about so much more than zip-lines and roofs. She’s asking Evie to leap with her into a new white-painted world full of trust and hope and _them_.

Evie squeezes Mal’s hand. “I've never been less afraid in my life.” Which is a truth painted in half-and-half shades, but Evie claims it as her own.

Mal’s gaze turns so deep, Evie swears she glimpses her girlfriend’s soul. 

Together, they step to the edge of the roof, where Ben fits them in side-by-side harnesses.

He clips Evie’s harness to the cord.

And then he steps to Mal. “All you’ve gotta do is leap,” he whispers, clicking her harness onto the cord as well. “And the world will catch you.”

Mal gives his arm a squeeze. “Thanks for setting this up, Ben.”

“Any time.” His voice is as soft as snow. He backs away, leaving Mal standing side-by-side with Evie.

And Evie knows: Ben has just said good-bye.

And Evie also knows: When Mal casts her fiery green gaze toward her, when their gazes flicker together in a fiery bond forged from the warmth of their twin souls, Mal is saying hello.

So Evie returns her greeting.

“And if the world doesn’t catch you,” she whispers, her gaze soul-linked with Mal’s, “I will.”

“Good.” Mal grins a grin that trembles in the light of the crescent moon. “Because I’ll be right there to catch you back.”

Evie breathes in deep, as if she is breathing in the promise of Mal’s words. “On three?”

“On three.” Mal nods.

“One.” Evie slides her boots to the icy edge of the roof.

“Two.” Mal reaches out to take Evie’s hand.

And then, their fingers linked and their hearts beating in tandem, they shout: “Three!” And leap from the roof into their new world.

Evie’s stomach flies into her throat. The chill wind nips at her cheeks, humming through her ears. The zip-line cord whistles and jerks, but holds her upright. She slides in a diagonal down-down-down, whooping and hollering and calling her delight, the trees flashing by in a blur of emerald and brown. The ground rises up to meet her. And her boots touch down on a fluffy bank of snow.

And Mal, cheering and crying out her freedom, lands on her feet beside her.

They greet each other with grins and high-fives. And then they each unclip and step from their harnesses, before tumbling together onto their backs, Evie lying one way and Mal the other.

Evie stretches out her arms, savoring the coolness of the snow. “You had this planned.”

“You loved it.” Mal rests her head on Evie’s shoulder, her laughter chiming in Evie’s ear.

Evie kisses her girlfriend’s cheek. “Every minute.”

Evie closes her eyes, savoring the rush. And then she opens them wide. 

Beside her, Mal’s eyes are open wide, too. 

Their world is no longer painted in halves. And, it seems, the world has chosen to respond to their step-forward into a Mal-and-Evie universe of wholes: It sprinkles them with magic, fresh flakes of snow that drift from the starry heavens, fluttering down onto Mal and Evie in a celebration of all things new. 

Mal reaches up to catch a snowflake. “We did it,” she whispers.

Evie grins a grin so wide, she feels it warm her wind-nipped face. “We sure did.” And then she quirks her head to the side so she can whisper into Mal’s ear: “I think we can do anything together.”

Mal shivers, and Evie is quite certain, not just from the ice of snow cool against their backs. “I think you’re right.”

Mal is by her side, safe and warm and and wearing her Evie-jacket. And Evie’s heart is fluttering because it has just discovered that she has the power to fly.

In that moment, Evie realizes she’s never felt more light.

“What have we been so afraid of?” She nuzzles her nose into the curve of Mal’s neck.

“I don’t know." Mal curls her fingers through Evie’s hair. "But I’m not afraid anymore. Are you?”

“No.” Evie’s voice is a whisper’s breath quieter than the wind. “And I don’t think I’ll be afraid of us ever again.”

Soon after, she redirects her gaze to the heavens, where the stars cast their silver light. 

This year, she does not make any wishes. 

Every wish Evie has ever wished has already come true. 

Instead, she holds onto her Christmas wish of _forever_. And wraps it in her heart, where she keeps it warm with her love for Mal.

* * *

Evie almost misses her chance at forever.

The next Christmas, when the girls are headed from university to visit with the boys, Mal and Evie get into such a heated discussion about forever and always that Mal nearly strikes a deer with her midnight-purple car. They veer from the road and land on a landscape of thin ice, where they almost fall into a frozen lake. 

But they escape their vehicle.

Mal, wearing a purple parka.

And Evie, wearing no jacket at all. Jacketless, Evie begins to freeze in the Christmas Eve blizzard.

Mal, once scared at the thought of opening her heart to Evie, is even more terrified at the thought of losing her always with the girl she loves. And so she carries a jacketless Evie three miles through the snowstorm, led on her path by the pure white deer. And they come to a bed-and-breakfast, where the inn-keeper gives them a hot bath, a warm meal, and a free room. _(Her husband, who looks just like Santa Claus, also pulls their car from the ice.)_

Mal saves Evie’s life that night.

And after, Mal opens her heart. She opens it so completely, every emotion she’s ever felt for Evie shines in a brilliant spectrum of light reflected within her fiery green eyes. 

Emotions that deepen and turn vulnerable when she makes love to her always, learning for the very first time what it’s like to hold her girlfriend in her arms, skin-to-skin and trembling.

That night changes things. 

Once opened, Mal’s heart does not close. 

Once unleashed, Mal’s emotions do not become reconfined.

She makes love to her always each night after. In the hotel room when they’re visiting the boys for Christmas. In the backseat of the car on their way home, when the fire in her belly is too hot and she cannot wait another moment to pull Evie into her arms, skin-to-skin. And in their shared dorm room, where they’ve pushed their singles together to form a double.

Every time, she learns something new.

Like when she smooths her fingers along Evie’s bare legs, Evie sighs and kisses her.

Or when she suckles on Evie’s lower lip, Evie moans and deepens the kiss.

Or when she traces touches along Evie’s belly and down-down-down, Evie shivers and breathes her name. 

So it’s no surprise, really, that this year, their New Year’s opens like this:

They lay tangled together within their sheets, Evie nestled in the crook of Mal’s arm. The silver moon shines through their dorm window, splashing its full-moon light across their naked skin. 

“I love the way our skin looks together,” Evie says, resting her fingers on Mal’s. “Like caramel and cream.”

“Mmm. Me, too. And…” Mal taps Evie’s fingers. “…I just realized. You have really long fingers. I never noticed before.”

Evie pounces on her girlfriend, nibbling her neck and making her whimper. “The better to please you with, my dear.” She slides her fingers beneath the sheets, tracing the outline of Mal’s breasts and waist.

Mal moans and flips them so that Evie is on her back, and Mal is hovering above. “You do realize we’re never making it to that party if you keep touching me like that?” She captures Evie’s hands, holding them above her head.

And even though Evie’s heart is a crash of thunder within her chest, she juts her lower lip out into a pout. “But you promised, M.”

Mal lifts her gaze to the ceiling and sighs. “You gave me that look.”

“What look?” Evie toys with a strand of purple fire.

Mal redirects her gaze to Evie’s, a wicked glint in her fiery green. “You know what look, Evie. The wounded seductress one. You have it mastered.”

Evie grins. “I do, don’t I?”

Mal narrows her fiery gaze. A heartbeat later, and she growls, swooping down to suckle on Evie’s lower lip.

And now it’s Evie’s turn to moan. Sliding her tongue into Mal’s open mouth, she savors the taste of her fiery fairy, shivering when Mal runs her fingers down her naked legs.

And then Mal shifts, and her fingers start exploring other places. Evie’s tender breasts and Evie’s shivering belly…and secret places further down. “Are you sure you want to go to that party, E?” Mal wears a wicked smirk which takes shape within her wicked voice. “We could stay here instead. Doing this.”

"You're evil," Evie whimpers. But she lifts her hips to Mal’s touch. And begins to shake.

Even as she crumbles, a thought lights itself within her mind. This is their first year in college. Their very first college New Year’s. And if she gives in, if she lets Mal keep touching her like – for all that is and ever was wicked, like _that_ – then they’re going to miss out on making memories.

So she closes her eyes. And she rocks her hips. And she moans and she trembles and she cries out Mal’s name.

But when Mal’s triumphant dimples pop out onto her cheeks, Evie flips them both so she is the one hovering over Mal, and Mal is the one gazing up at her with wide eyes. “Well played, Miss Mal.” She nips at Mal’s lips. “Now get dressed. Because we’re going to a party.”

Mal pillows her lips into a pretty pout.

A pout that Evie kisses away. “I mean it.” She slips from their bed and grabs Mal’s hand, pulling her from their rumpled sheets. “We’re not missing out.”

Once on her feet, Mal tips her forehead against Evie’s. “We’ll come back after?”

“So you can keep touching me like that?” Evie nuzzles her girlfriend’s button nose. “Trust me, M. It’s guaranteed.”

And so they get dressed _(for the first time in two days)_ in sweaters and in leather pants. And just before Evie reaches for her jacket, Mal reaches for it first. 

“Here,” she says, opening the sapphire parka for Evie.

Evie steps into her coat. “What’s this about?” She turns to face Mal.

Mal kisses her lips. “So you stay warm, baby.” She pulls up the zipper. “I never want to see you cold again.” Mal’s eyes are a vibrant green with luminous golden flecks, much like the night they first made love.

And Evie knows: There’s so much more that Mal isn’t saying. She doesn’t want to see Evie cold and she doesn’t want to see Evie hurt. But more than that, she doesn’t want to lose Evie to a world of snowstorms and ice. And so she bundles Evie into her coat so she can hold onto their warm world of infinity painted in blue-and-purple shades of always. A world Mal is protecting with her dragon’s heart.

Evie shivers at Mal’s lover’s eyes, and traces a fingertip across her lover’s cheekbone. “You’re my dragon-heart,” she whispers.

The love in Mal’s eyes slips into her smile. “And you’re my princess.” This time, she's the one to nuzzle Evie’s nose.

Evie sighs a happy sigh crafted from thoughts of _I-love-yous_ and _forevers_. And then she takes Mal’s hand and leads her from the room, promising, “Just a couple of hours. Then I’m bringing you right back here, dragon-heart.”

Mal hums at the sound of her new lover’s name. “Promise?”

“I promise.” Evie squeezes Mal’s hand.

The party takes place on another roof, this time the frosted roof of their dorms, where kids bounce to the percussive beats of drums and toss back shots of vodka-and-Jello. 

Mal tosses back two shots of strawberry before Evie takes her hand and says, “If you’re drunk, how will I have my way with you when we get back home?” 

Mal’s eyes fly wide, and she sets down her empty cup. After that, she doesn’t pick up another.

Mal and Evie mingle with their friends – for Mal, two girls with multi-colored hair and nose rings; for Evie, two girls and a boy wearing their own push-the-bar fashions – but they always come back together.

They come back together on the dance floor, where Mal cuddles Evie close, swaying with her to the drum’s not-so-slow beat and tracing touches through her hair. _("Careful, E. If you keep dancing with me like this, I'll never let you go." Evie curls closer. "You promise?")_

They come back together while twirling sparklers, their gazes interlaced and soul-bonded, the sparks dancing from their sticks and through their eyes. _("What are you looking at, M?" Mal grins. "I'm looking at you, E.")_

They come back together, arms linked and fingers always touching, during some of the evening’s crazier festivities – bowling on the roof; throwing darts at balloons; throwing balloons-filled-with-water from the roof down at the passers-by (until someone down below shouts, “Hey! They’re throwing alcohol!” and the kids stop throwing balloons and start puncturing them with pins, savoring the contents themselves).

They come back together when Mal lays her balloon on the rooftop, refusing to drink, choosing instead to sway again with Evie to the wild drumbeat – a wild beat that matches the wild thrum of Evie’s heart. A thrum that thrums wilder when Mal spells Evie’s lips with kisses so magical, they make Evie’s lips tingle and spark.

At one point, they come apart when Mal worries that Evie might be hungry, and so says, “You really haven’t eaten in two days, princess. Let me get you something,” and hurries off to the food table to pile a plate high with fruits and cheeses.

While she’s gone, Evie wanders through the crowd of bouncing college students, slipping into the half-moonlit shadows beneath a rafter.

This turns out to be a mistake.

Because from this rafter hangs some leftover Christmas mistletoe, green with leaves and red with berries. So vibrant that it’s noticed by a passing sophomore, who skids to a stop, his fingers clenched around a damp-and-deflated balloon.

“Waiting for me, beautiful?” He leans himself against the edge of the building, so close that his vodka-soaked breath slaps Evie’s face.

Evie wrinkles her nose and takes a step back. “Actually, I’m waiting for my girlfriend. She turns into a dragon sometimes. You might want to run.”

“Girlfriend, huh?” The boy steps closer, leering and reaching for Evie’s waist.

Evie slaps his hand away. “I really wouldn’t do that.”

“Oh, feisty.” The boy shakes his hand, then licks his lips. “Hmm. Girlfriend. Yeah. I can work with that.” He lifts his hand toward Evie’s face.

Evie slides her head to the side, avoiding his touch. “How about my fist? Can you work with that? Because back when we were robbing pirate ships on the Isle, _my girlfriend_ taught me how to fight.”

The boy blinks. “Did your girlfriend also tell you that you’re the prettiest girl at the party?” He lowers his voice, making an attempt at suave which comes out slurred. He stumbles closer, then steadies himself by clutching Evie's shoulder. “Because you—”

The boy’s words are cut off by the fist curving around his throat. A second later, and Evie is treated to a glimpse over-the-boy’s-shoulder of fiery eyes and purple-fire hair. “This guy bothering you, E?”

Evie bites back a smirk. “Just can’t seem to take ‘no’ for an answer, M.”

Mal narrows her eyes and tosses the boy from her fist, so that he stumbles against the brick wall of the roof.

The boy massages his throat. “You must be the girlfriend,” he chokes out.

“And you must be the guy who’d better run.” Mal’s eyes blaze a bright-and-lethal green. “Unless, of course, you’d like me to start playing darts with body parts.” She flicks her gaze to the boy’s crotch. “Wonder how many points I’d get for hitting the bullseye below the belt?”

“M!” Evie delivers a soft slap to Mal’s arm. She’s grinning so wide, her cheeks ache.

But the boy isn’t grinning.

The boy is staring into Mal’s electric eyes and turning paler than the snow frosting the rooftop and the streets. 

“You’re a freak.” He clutches his crotch. “And your girlfriend deserves better.” He pushes into the crowd of dancers, disappearing as the drums crescendo into a fast-and-frantic beat.

And it’s those words, _your girlfriend deserves better_ , that bring Evie back to that night at the bed-and-breakfast. The night Mal saved her life. The night they first made love, after Mal confided that she’d spent the previous two months scared she wasn’t good enough for Evie. Because Evie had confessed her dreams of someday – someday wanting a forever; someday wanting a family – and Mal was terrified she couldn’t deliver, since her only experience with motherhood had been a mother who had never figured out how to love her.

That night, after Mal’s confession, Mal’s eyes had shone with vibrant shades of love. And she’d told Evie: _“After tonight, I want you to know that I want everything you want. A future. A family. And really, I just want you. And I want you to have all of me.”_

Evie’s chest twists, and she glances at her forever, expecting the confrontation with the boy to stir up old fears.

But there is no fear in Mal’s no-longer-blazing eyes. There are flickers of fire, and gold flecks that dance across the green. There is a deepness, a tenderness, more deep and more tender than anything Evie has ever seen reflected in her lover’s eyes. There is Mal, and Mal is everything.

Mal steps to Evie. “Are we done, baby?” She leans her forehead against Evie’s. “I really want to take you home.”

Evie gazes into her girlfriend’s fiery green eyes, glimpsing her future in their depths. Her heart squeezes, so she takes and squeezes Mal’s hand. “Sure,” she says. “Let’s get out of here, dragon-heart.”

And Evie leads Mal from the roof, stopping only to feed her a few bites of strawberries and cheese (and to nibble some strawberries and cheese from Mal’s fingers, Mal having tossed the plate she prepared when she caught sight of Evie with the boy). 

Just as they’re opening the door on the roof that will lead them back to the dorms, the kids begin counting down the New Year. So Evie cradles Mal in her arms, gazing into the eyes of her forever, and shares the countdown with the girl she loves. When they reach _one_ , Evie spells Mal’s lips with a magical kiss of her own. And then she takes Mal’s hand and leads her back to their room.

Their clothes come off quick, until Evie is hovering over Mal, skin-to-skin, tracing her fingertip along the dent in Mal’s lip: a touch so soft, so tender.

Mal closes her eyes and sighs. “What are you doing, E?” Her voice is a whisper’s breath.

“I’m loving you, dragon-heart.” She traces another touch along Mal’s lip, earning herself another sigh. “I’m loving my fiery green eyes. I’m loving my forever.”

And for the first time since their first time, Evie doesn’t rush. She explores. She smooths her kisses across Mal’s collarbones, savoring the sensitive skin at the curve of Mal’s throat. She kisses lower, in between the peaks of Mal’s breasts – and then she kisses these peaks, too, swirling her tongue around Mal’s cream-and-salt skin.

Mal moans and opens her eyes, treating Evie to her spectrum-of-light gaze.

A gaze Evie claims as she kisses lower, to Mal’s belly; as she runs her fingers along the curve of Mal’s thighs, making her gasp; as she kisses lower still, turning Mal’s gasps into moans and throaty cries of Evie’s name.

She learns her lover’s secrets. She learns her lover’s needs. She watches her lover’s gaze shatter into a kaleidoscope of bliss, colored by all the emotions swirling through her dragon-heart.

And then Mal lowers Evie onto her back so that she can learn Evie’s secrets, so that she can learn Evie’s needs. Like the way Evie shivers when Mal kisses the curve of her neck. Or the way she squeals when Mal smooths her touch beneath Evie’s breasts, before kissing their peaks. Or the way Evie falls into bliss when Mal kisses lower while smoothing touches along Evie’s legs, which Evie has wrapped around Mal’s shoulders.

They explore and they explore and they explore until their muscles are melted and their skin sings with bliss. And then they collapse atop their pillows, holding each other in a soul-bonded stare.

Mal gazes at Evie with such a deep and forever-kind of tenderness, Evie feels it in all the crevices of her heart. “You’re my always, Evie,” she whispers, tracing a finger across Evie’s cheekbone. “My always girl.”

Evie’s emotions are thick within her throat. So she kisses Mal and she kisses her and she kisses her, until she can whisper: “And you’re my forever Mal.”

Because Mal has gone through so many incarnations. From the girl who battled pirates for rum, to the girl terrified to open her heart, to the girl willing to fight for the chance to bare her heart and make Evie her always. But one thing Mal will always be is Evie’s forever. Her forever Mal.

Once Mal is asleep, Evie slips from their sheets and steps to the window, where she finds a star which flashes not with silver, but with green. “You’ve given me everything. Thank you. But, if it’s okay, I have just a few more wishes to tack onto my wish of _forever_. I wish that Mal and I always feel this happy. That we always feel this free. And that our love always feels this tender and this deep.”

That year, Evie gets her wish. She gets it so much and so many times, she and Mal build a new world together.

A world they solidify three years later, when Mal gifts Evie a gingerbread house with a single turret, which she’s decorated with murals of their memories. There, Mal slides to a knee and asks her always girl to become her wife.

And Evie says yes.

* * *

_At this point, the author would like to share with you the New Year’s the girls celebrated directly after they got engaged. But such recountings really aren’t appropriate in a tale meant for teens._

__

__

_Suffice it to say that the police were called by neighbors on three separate occasions, only to arrive at a certain gingerbread house with a single turret where two girls hastily slipped into their robes and donned their brightest smiles, hiding behind their backs hands covered in strawberry juice and whipped cream._

_“Sorry, officer.” A certain purple-haired fairy nibbled her lip to stop a wicked smirk from emerging. “We’re just redecorating.”_

_Her blue-haired accomplice snickered into her shoulder. “With edibles,” she said._

_After that, the officer backed away, hiding a grin behind his hand. But he could not hide his voice on the radio: “Just a couple of newly engageds experimenting with edibles. Yeah. Same girls as last week. Over and out.”_

_(For other tales on the girls’ sexual shenanigans, please refer to their college-aged histories, which include such exploits as breaking kitchen tables and gifting young Tremaine daughters ear plugs to aid them in their noise-deprived sleep.)_

* * *

The Christmas Eve after the girls graduate from university, they celebrate their marriage at the same bed-and-breakfast where Mal once saved Evie’s life.

A few days later on New Year’s Eve, they take their honeymoon to Wonderland, a place they’d once enjoyed on a summer-before-college road trip with Carlos and Jay.

There, they crawl through a rabbit-hole and into a world of techni-color wonder, where every pink and every red and every purple and every blue is vibrant and rich and full of life. And in the center of a vibrant field of green, perched atop a blue-and-purple flower, there sits a caterpillar smoking a pipe.

“Who are youuuu?” The creature blows a puff of circular smoke, which fades away into the rose-scented wind.

Mal slips her fingers through Evie’s. “I’m Mal.” She raises their joined hands. “And this is my wife. Evie.”

Evie’s sapphire and Mal’s amethyst rings, and both of their golden wedding bands, glint in the light of the vibrant blue-and-purple sun.

Evie lays her cheek atop Mal’s shoulder. “How do you do?” she asks the caterpillar.

The creature puffs another ring of smoke. “I doooo just fine.” He blows the smoke so that it creates a path. It, too, blue-and-purple. “Follow the smoke to your surprise.”

“Our surprise?” Mal’s voice rises on the second word, her eyebrows knitted together.

Evie tweaks a strand of Mal’s purple-fire hair. “It must be Ben. He said he was going to pull some strings.”

Mal’s eyebrows unknit. "That makes sense." Her voice is touched with emotion. Taking Evie's hand, she leads her along the trail of Mal-and-Evie-colored smoke until they reach a flower garden. Here, too, the colors splash with vibrancy, every purple and blue and pink and red flower in techni-color. Each of the flowers have faces, too, and when Mal and Evie step along the wonderous path, the flowers begin to sing.

But they don’t just sing any song. They sing a song Mal and Evie once sung while they were living their Auradon lives apart, but had come back together for a night on the Isle:

_And you can find me in the space between_  
_Where two worlds come to meet_  
_I'll never be out of reach_  
_'Cause you're a part of me so you can find me in the space between_

The notes caress Evie’s ears, and she gasps. Because here, in this Wonderland space-between world, she and Mal have never been closer. They’re married now. Wife and wife. And they’ll never be torn apart.

“I sent Ben the lyrics,” Mal whispers, taking Evie in her arms. “I didn’t know why he wanted them, but I thought it seemed right.”

“It’s perfect, dragon-heart.” Evie magics kisses onto Mal’s lips, until her own lips tingle and spark.

And Mal, grinning now, dances with Evie through the field of flowers. The song reaches its crescendo, and Mal places her lips to Evie’s ear. “You're still in my heart," she whispers. "It will always be you and me.”

Evie cuddles her wife to her chest, where their hearts beat in tandem. “Forever, M.”

Mal sweeps a kiss onto Evie’s cheek. “And always, E.”

Once the flowers finish their song, Mal leads Evie further along the path of purple-and-blue smoke, where they discover a number of mice hosting a tea party.

“Look, everyone!” squeaks a mouse whose brown curls fall into her equally brown eyes. “It’s the newlyweds.”

The mice all jump and cheer and squeak, and invite Mal and Evie to join them at their tea party, where one mouse perches atop a sugar caddy, and another scurries about the table in a hat meant for a chef, serving mushrooms, and a third backstrokes in a cup filled with amber liquid.

Evie hides her laughter between a press of her lips. “Sure.” She steps with Mal to the table, where they sit upon a bench. “We’d love to.”

Now, readers of these histories might recall that the girls were once invited to a similar tea party, which they refused for precisely this reason: Often, tea served at tea parties held by mice smells more like herbs and less like tea. So when Mal sips from her cup, and Evie, grimacing with nerves, sips from hers, it’s really no surprise that they end up floating up from their seats, joining each other atop a blue-and-purple Willow tree.

“Oh, M.” Evie laughs a laugh she feels down deep, and curls herself into the cobalt branches of the tree. “How do we always get into these situations?”

From her shelter of blue-and-purple leaves, Mal blows her wife a kiss. “You always did make me float.”

Evie’s laughter splutters into giggles.

Soon, Evie’s stomach begins to sink, and with it, so does Evie. Mal joins her, too, and they float together back onto their bench.

Once seated, Mal picks up a mushroom.

And Evie, still coming down from her time floating in the tree, covers her wife’s hand, concealing the red-and-yellow treat. “Are you really sure you want to eat that?”

Mal shrugs. “When in Wonderland, do as the Wonders do,” she says, popping the mushroom into her mouth. 

She chews her treat.

And she swallows.

And then she shrinks to the size of Evie’s thumb. “Oops," she says. "Guess I really shouldn’t have eaten that.” Her voice is squeakier than the voices of the rodents serving them tea.

Evie picks up her forever and cradles her in the palm of her hand. “What am I gonna do with you, dragon-heart? Oh.” She surveys Mal’s tiny button nose and her tiny fiery eyes and the tiny dimples that have popped out onto her tiny cheeks. “You’re adorable. Maybe we should keep you this size.”

Mal places a hand on either side of Evie's nose and nuzzles with her whole body. “If you kept me this size,” she says in her squeaky-mouse voice, deepened now with husk, “I wouldn’t be able to do half the things you love.”

Evie’s breath catches in her throat, and she can’t help but flash on days and afternoons and nights trembling and moaning and crying out Mal's name.

With widened eyes, she whirls to face the mice, who are tossing bits of sugar. “Anyone have a remedy for size issues?” she calls

The mice drop their sugar cubes and chatter. “Of course!” and “Sure do!” and “Just a moment, my newlywedded lady!”

And so they offer Mal a cup of peppermint-scented tea.

She takes a sip and licks her lips. And grows back to Mal-size. And then she floats off into the clouds. “Hey!” she calls, swimming through a cloud shaped like a fairy. “I can see everything from up here.”

Evie again presses her laughter between her lips and settles back onto the bench, waiting for her wife to return back to the ground.

When Mal is once again grounded, they follow the path of blue-and-purple smoke to the edge of a crimson sea, where the mountains turn purple and the sky transforms from turquoise to cobalt to a backdrop of black with blue-and-purple stars. 

There, they meet a blue-and-purple cat who winks at them once, then fades into nothing but a smile. “This way please and please and please.” He bobs along, a crescent grin, leading them to a multi-colored hot air balloon. “For the newlyweds. We thought you’d like a ride.”

“Cool.” Mal reaches out for the basket floating from the balloon.

But Evie grabs Mal’s arm. “Are you sure, M? We just got you down from the clouds.”

Mal’s smile seems to glow, and she tucks a blue curl behind Evie’s ear. “I always end up in the clouds when I’m with you, E. And you’re the one who keeps me rooted to the ground.”

A warmth like firelight dances into Evie’s heart. “You for me, too,” she whispers.

Together, they climb into the basket of the balloon and float not into clouds, but into a world of stars, where each of Evie's wishes wink at her from the heavens. She’s wished for Mal. She’s wished for happiness. She’s wished for forever. And floating in Mal’s arms, she reflects that each of her wishes has come true.

She snuggles back against Mal’s chest, where she feels her lover's heart thundering against her back. “I used to wish on a star every year at New Year’s.”

“Mmm.” Mal nuzzles Evie’s ear. “And what do you wish for this year, always girl?”

Evie stares into the blue-and-purple night, and finds herself a blue-and-purple star. “I wish for everything with you, Mal.”

“And family?” Mal’s voice lowers to a breath. “Do you wish for that, too?”

Evie melts into her wife’s arms. “Yes. When we’re ready. I wish for family, too.”

After that, Evie pulls Mal to the floor of their basketed balloon, where she kisses and touches her in all the places she’s come to know so well, tasting lips and skin and _Mal_. They float off into the starry night, a night filled with wishes, savoring each other, skin-to-skin, and the knowledge that all of their wishes have come true.

* * *

The following year, Mal and Evie are granted another wish: They start a family. First, by adopting an eleven-year old red-headed girl from the Isle. And then, on Christmas Eve-turned-to-Day, by welcoming a newborn dragon-hearted daughter with purple-fire hair and eyes every shade of Evie’s brown.

That year on New Year’s, Evie stands in the shadows of the nursery, painted purple and muraled with green fabric hearts, and watches her wife rock their newborn daughter. With Noelle Rose’s tiny face cradled to her breast, Mal sings their child a song:

 _And I’ll always be right here_  
_Where two worlds have come to meet_  
_You’ll always be in my heart_  
_Here, in our space between_

“It’s lovely,” Evie whispers, the emotion thick within her throat.

Mal glances up. And their gazes meet, locked together in a world of infinity, where always love and forever truth shine from both their eyes.

After, Evie steps with their eleven-year-old, Cecily, out onto the deck of their gingerbread, single-turreted home. And she points at the stars. “You see those stars?” she asks her daughter.

Cecily nods. “‘Course, Mama.”

“Well.” Evie sits down on a wicker chair and pulls her daughter onto her lap. “If you make a wish on one at New Year’s, that wish will come true.”

“Really?” Cecily cranes around to peer at Evie, her eyes widened in wonder.

“Really.” Evie’s voice is thick with husk.

Cecily’s widened gaze deepens, the stars shining bright within her green eyes. “Oh, Mama.” She throws her arms around Evie’s neck and squeezes her in a hug. “I’ve already had all my wishes come true.”

“And what were your wishes, sweetheart?” Evie smooths her hand over her daughter’s vibrant hair.

“That’s easy.” Cecily kisses Evie’s cheek. “I wished for you and Mom.”

After that, Evie’s throat is too thick for speech. So she kisses her daughter’s forehead instead.

Two years later, Evie introduces Noelle to the secret of the stars. Holding her child in her arms on the deck of their house, she points at the sky. “Make a wish.”

Noelle wrinkles her tiny button nose. “Mama!” She cries. And then: “Mom! Sister!”

Laughter chimes from Evie’s lips, and she dances with her daughter across the deck. “I’m right here, little dragon.” 

And soon, Mom and Sister are there, too, joining Evie and Noelle in their dance. Mal wraps her arms around Evie’s shoulders, and together, they cradle Noelle between them both, with Cecily wrapping her arms around Evie’s waist from behind.

When their dance comes to a close, Mal cups Evie’s cheek. “Are your wishes still coming true, always girl?”

Evie kisses the palm of Mal’s hand. “My wishes come true every single day, dragon-heart.” 

“Mine, too," Mal says.

Mal’s eyes shine with infinity, so Evie kisses her wife’s infinity lips, their little Noelle nestled between them both.

The year Noelle turns three, her wish is: “Story!” So Cecily, now fourteen, gathers Noelle onto her lap, and tells her the story of their moms: “Once upon a time, two girls came together to make all their wishes come true…”

And Mal and Evie, snug in each other’s arms, listen from the doorway of Noelle’s bedroom, their hearts beating dragon-fierce and free.

At the age of four, Noelle’s wish is: “Cookie!” 

So Cecily puts her little sister into a tiny chef’s hat, and the two mix dough until it covers the kitchen, their faces, and Noelle’s tiny mouth. 

“Cookie!” Noelle screeches, nibbling up the dough before it ever makes it into the oven.

Mal and Evie excuse themselves from the kitchen to collapse with laughter in the den, tangled up in one another’s arms.

This, then, brings us to the year Noelle turns five, and Cecily sixteen. And on this particular New Year’s, the festivities begin with a loud knock on a certain gingerbread-house door.

Evie, who’s reading a physics book on the couch, casts her wife a startled glance. “Are we expecting company?”

Mal tilts her head to the side. There’s a glint in her eyes that seems an awful lot like suspicion. “Where’s Cecily?”

Evie drops her book. “You don’t think…” Her words falter when she jumps from the couch and, together with Mal, hurries to the door.

They open it to discover a certain red-headed girl wearing a guilty smirk and a dragon-hearted Evie-gifted jacket. _(“Take good care of this jacket,”Mal had said on Cecily’s sixteenth birthday, when she’d given her the gift. “It carries a part of my heart.”)_

And beside their Evie-jacketed, Mal-i-fied daughter, there stands a cop.

“This girl belong to you?” he asks, gripping Cecily’s arm.

Evie deflates. “Yes, officer. Same as last week.”

Mal tenses. “Cecily Nicole, what have you done this time?”

Cecily shrinks behind the cop. “I just tossed some water balloons from a building. The people below looked like they needed some help ringing in the New Year.”

Evie tosses her wife a glare. “I told you not to tell her that story.”

Mal holds out her hands. “I didn’t think she was going to do anything with it.”

Evie sighs and hangs her head. “At least she isn’t setting empty store crates on fire anymore.”

Cecily edges out from behind the cop, who seems to be having trouble schooling his features into a stern expression. “The people in the store looked cold. I was just trying to warm them up.”

“And that story came from Jay when he visited with Carlos at Christmas,” Mal says, leaning her cheek on Evie’s shoulder.

“Jay is never talking to her again.” Evie makes an attempt at a scowl, but ends up threading her fingers through her wife’s purple-fire hair. 

Because even now, after six years of marriage and twelve years of _them_ , she can’t not touch Mal when she’s standing this close.

“Excuse me, ladies.” The cop disentangles his arm from Cecily’s, allowing the girl to enter her home. “But can you make sure she stays out of trouble from now on?”

And Evie and Mal, who at sixteen were battling pirates for rum, and who know the wild streak that runs through their daughter’s Isle blood, bite their lips to hide their own guilty smirks. “Of course,” Mal says.

“Sure,” Evie agrees. “You won’t hear from her again.”

Behind them, Cecily disguises her giggles with a cough.

When the cop makes his exit, leaving Mal and Evie alone with their daughter, they both round on Cecily with a flash in their eyes. “Grounded,” Evie says, pointing at Cecily, at the same time Mal says, “How is it that you always get caught?”

“Mal!” Mal’s name explodes from Evie’s lips. “It sounds like you’re encouraging her.”

Mal widens her eyes and holds up her hands. “I would never…” Her words trail off as if there’s more she wants to say, but she’s keeping it locked behind lips twitching with laughter.

“Don’t worry, Mama.” Cecily bends to kiss Evie’s cheek. “I promise to be good from now on. I’ve just been bored with school out.”

“I’m holding you to that,” Evie says, returning her daughter’s kiss. “Now go to your room.”

Cecily lifts her lips into a half-smile. “It’s New Year’s. You know I won’t stay there.”

Evie covers her ears. “You really are awful at hiding your misdeeds.”

With that, Cecily winks both at Evie and at Mal, who she also treats to a kiss-on-the-cheek, and then she disappears down the hall. A moment later, her door clicks opened and then closed.

The house swells with silence. A silence unnatural in a house with a sixteen-year-old miscreant and a five-year-old lover of cookies. 

Evie’s stomach crashes to her knees. “Where’s Noelle?”

Mal puckers her lips into a frown. “She was here coloring a minute ago.”

But Noelle’s scribbles are scattered on the floor along with her crayons, abandoned by their child owner.

Evie places her hands around her mouth and calls: “Noelle?” She steps from the living room into the hallway, Mal following behind. “Noelle Rose?”

When Mal and Evie step into the kitchen, they discover the first clue on the floor: a crumpled up, empty package of chocolate chip cookies.

The second clue is an assortment of childlike giggles drifting from beneath the table.

Evie stifles a groan and bends to her knees, peering into the space. And discovers a little girl with purple-fire hair, dancing brown eyes … and a mouth stained brown with chocolate chips.

“Cookie!” Noelle cries, stuffing another treat into her mouth.

From somewhere behind Evie, Mal dissolves into throaty laughter. “I told you we should get a lock for the cookie cabinet.”

“Consider it done,” Evie grumbles. “The moment the stores open.”

But there’s really only one thing Evie can do: She sweeps her youngest daughter into her arms, stands and tickles her stomach, and says, “No more cookies for you, little dragon. You’re cookied out for the next year.”

“New Year!” Noelle cries, bouncing in Evie’s arms. “Wish upon a star! Now, Mama, now!”

“Bath first.” Evie carries their daughter from the kitchen, leaving Mal to clean the chocolate stains from the floor. “Then we make our wish.”

When Noelle is bathed and dressed in her purple pajamas, Evie tucks her into bed. With the night sky shining through her window, Evie points at the stars. “There they are. What are you going to wish for this year?”

Noelle gazes at Evie through eyes more serious than any five-year-old has ever worn. “You wanna know a secret, Mama?”

“Sure.” Evie smooths her daughter’s hair from her forehead. “Tell me.”

Noelle sits up and places her mouth to Evie’s ear. “I want a baby. A baby brother or a baby sister.”

And Evie, whose heart turns to flame at the words, nuzzles her daughter’s cheek. “We’ll see,” she says.

Soon after, Cecily creeps into the room to tell her little sister a story. _(“Once upon a time, there were two little girls who met on opposite sides of a Christmas tree…”)_

Evie pauses for a moment to listen with a fiery heart to the story of her and her forever Mal. 

And then, just before the clock strikes twelve, she steps onto the deck, where her dragon-heart is staring at the silver stars. “Making a wish, forever Mal?”

Mal's smile seems to glow. “I told you, always girl. All of my wishes have already come true.”

“Oh, I don’t know.” Evie comes up behind Mal, wrapping her dragon-heart in her arms. “I think I know a wish you haven’t wished yet.”

“Oh?” Mal leans back against Evie’s chest. “You gonna tell me?”

“Mmm.” Evie rests her chin atop Mal’s head. “I’ll even make it for you.”

Mal hums a happy hum. “Okay.”

“In this next year,” Evie says, sweeping her fingers through purple fire, “I wish for a child. A little boy or a little girl with hair as blue as mine, and eyes as fiery green as yours.”

Mal pulls back a shivering breath and turns to face her always girl. “It worked?”

Evie grins. “Looks like our family’s gonna become a little bit bigger, dragon-heart.” She touches her hand to her stomach. “And since we made sure our donor has eyes as fiery green as yours…”

Mal blinks a sheen of tears from her eyes. “Come here,” she says, and pulls Evie into her arms. "I love you so much."

"And I love you." Evie kisses her wife's cheek. "I always will." 

After that, there isn’t much talking. The two mothers-to-be are too busy kissing each other in their infinite world of love and forever and always.

_(Both Evie and Noelle’s wishes come true that year._

_In fact, they come true twice.)_


End file.
